


opening doorways to secret rooms

by sternenrotz



Series: broken hearts hurt but they make us strong (queer horror verse) [3]
Category: The Horrors (Band)
Genre: Agender Character, Gen, Nonbinary Character, Other, Platonic Kissing, Self-Esteem Issues, but it's all good by the end i guess, experimenting with presentation, internalised bullshit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 21:43:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4035598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sternenrotz/pseuds/sternenrotz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Faris wears a dress for the first time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	opening doorways to secret rooms

**Author's Note:**

> titled after "Attitude" by Suede.
> 
> set in 2012-ish. as always, Faris is agender and Josh's gender is a big mess and they're hatemates on a level somewhere between platonic and not-so-much. the dress Faris is wearing is the sleeveless one on the right in this polyvore set, together with the floral tights in the middle ([x](http://www.polyvore.com/cgi/set?id=157809818))
> 
> also, I made a tumblr to talk about this verse, come say hello ([x](http://tokencisgenderfriendtomfurse.tumblr.com))

“Hold still, Bird.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Faris says back.

They're sat on Josh's cramped ugly couch, backs pushed-up-straight and feet touching and faces too close to each other. Faris only narrowly keeps from flinching when Josh almost pokes them in the eye with the stick of kohl _again_.

“Ouch.”

“Shush, you big infant.”

Josh's calloused fingers dig into their jaw to hold them steady when she draws a line from the corner of Faris' eye and puts a wing on it.

“Almost over now.”

That's not very reassuring, but Faris makes a reassured noise as it is. They try not to squirm when Josh pinches their jaw a bit tighter.

“I'll do the other wing now,” she whispers, breath in their face, and Faris shuts their eyes again and let Josh keep on working.

It’s not their first time wearing eyeliner, by any means, and it’s obviously not Josh’s first time applying makeup, either. Still, her hands are shaky and Faris feels more twitchy than they normally do, agitated by the stiff semi-sheer material of their dress.

“There you go.”

“Thanks.”

Faris waits for a few more seconds before blinking their eyes back open, lids heavy and strange with heavy layered liner and mascara and that fucking _silver glitter_ eyeshadow that Josh wouldn't quit pestering them about. Their eyeballs itch the same way their insides do, with a little bit of excitement and a lot of nerves and just the slightest hint of terror.

“How're you feeling right now?” Josh asks, when she's reaching for her purse on the floor to dig out a somewhat-scratched up black tube of lipstick.

“Nervous.”

Faris picks at the lace of their tights, scratchy and too-tight on their sensitive skin. They watch as Josh applies a generous amount of slutty-deep-red, her words, and she blots the excess off with a Kleenex. She’s wearing _butch_ today, all black with Doc Martens and one of those army jackets that hide her breasts, but it hasn’t stopped her from doing her hair in soft waves and covering her face in glitter and makeup.

“Shouldn't be,” Josh says back, slightly muffled by the tissue still. “You look really pretty.”

“It's not,” Faris says, fidgets, or at least they _would_ fidget if every move didn’t make the sheer material of their dress scratchy against their bare arms and make them all the more aware of it. “Not about how I _look_. I'm just scared.”

Well, technically, it is about how they look.

“What d'you mean,” Josh starts to say, when Faris takes a second to choose their next words carefully, but they cut her off.

“That they won't understand it, I guess."

“That's bullshit.” Josh says it in that stupid casual-flippant way she gets sometimes, the one Faris hates about her, and she twirls her hair as if to really drive that flippancy home. “I mean, they're not going to _not_ understand, or at least if you explain it to them.”

Faris snorts. This is another thing they hate about her, how she seems to be completely unable to take anyone's worries seriously just because it's never been an issue for _her_.

“Yeah, I don't know how to put this, but…” Faris coughs. Their voice sounds too deep in this moment, makes them feel even more out of place in this getup, and their skin itches on the inside. “It's different if it's you, you know?”

“What d'you mean?”

“You _know_ ,” Faris insists, and isn't sure if that's meant to be purposefully obtuse or not, because, honestly, Josh _is_ a bit thick when it comes to these things sometimes. “'cause you're you and everyone was kind of _used_ to you being weird about presentation the whole time, so it's different.” Because they know Josh's about to cut in with something that's in all likelihood not going to make them feel better at all, they just keep talking. “And I'm just nervous 'cause I know that when people look at me they're going to see a bloke in a dress, so there you've got it.”

They’re not going to say more than that, about the reactions from strangers on the bus who aren’t Joe and Dilys or Tom.

Josh's pawy hand comes to lie itself down on top of Faris' knee. “But you're not.”

“I _know_ I'm not a bloke in a dress,” Faris says back. “It’s not gonna make it any less awful when people stare at me like I just came here for them to spit at me, though.”

Josh makes a noise that vaguely sounds like, “Oh.”

“Yeah, _oh_.”

Faris reaches to cover Josh's hand with their own. The contrast between everything about them right then is striking, their skin tones and Josh's chipped chewed down nails compared to their own freshly done ones, and how much more veiny and calloused Josh's hands are. Like that, in a strange roundabout way, their own body feels that little bit more comfortable.

“You know you can still,” Josh starts to say, and once again, Faris cuts her off.

“Yeah, I know.” Faris squeezes her hand, for lack of anything better to do that isn’t fidgeting in the strange fabric, and they say, “Don’t get me wrong. I _do_ want to do this. I mean, I’m nervous and anxious and terrified and all that but I’m also really excited to be doing it.”

Josh laughs, and it’s her dry laugh she keeps inside her mouth as opposed to the usual shrieky cackle. She leans in until she can touch her forehead to Faris’ temple, her breath cigarette-heavy against their face even through the cloud of cloying perfume that’s surrounding them both.

“It’s okay, Bird,” she says, that little giggle still in her voice. And her hand squeezes Faris’ knee a little bit tighter through the lace, and they really do not mind at all, and she says, “I’d kiss you right now but I don’t think my lipstick would hold up.”

Faris laughs back at her and echoes, “It’s okay.”

Josh’s cheek is rough under their lips, rugged and warm and still strangely soft underneath that roughness of not having shaved today. She actually cackles when Faris presses more kisses to her face, what they can reach the outer edge of her jaw where she’s ticklish.

“Knock it off, knock it off,” she squeals, indignant.

That really just makes Faris want to keep going, though. Or it would, if they didn't know her retaliation would be very rough and very, _very_ messy, but in any case it presses weird tiny giggles into their mouth.

Some of those giggles slip out into their voice when they say, “Sorry, Bear.”

Josh squawks once again, for no apparent reason this time.

Then Faris says, half into Josh’s skin, because they really like the noises she makes when they touch her there, apparently, “You ready to go?”

“Been ready the whole time, you twat,” Josh says back and swats at their leg.

Like that, the entire moment’s over, they’re back to their normal platonic hate-friendship, and maybe that’s another thing that comforts Faris.

“Come on.”

Faris catches a glimpse of their reflection in the full-length hallway mirror when they go to leave, their legs even longer than normally between the floaty skirt and the clunky chelsea boots, hair big and eyes glimmer-smokey, all spindly and straight lines and almost ethereal. They look like they actually have a waist with the belt detail of the dress, so skinny they’re more like a coat hanger. That’s how Rachel puts it. Maybe that glimpse lasts a little too long, because Josh nudges them in the side.

“You still good to go?”

“Yeah, of course,” Faris says back.

They still accept when Josh holds her hand out toward them.

The bus ride to Joe and Dilys’ flat is short and uncomfortable. They sit near the back, and Josh doesn’t let go of Faris’ hand the whole time. She puffs out her chest when she stares back at everyone who’s gawking until they look away, but that doesn’t mean Faris can’t still hear them whisper.

“I’m scared now,” Faris admits, when it’s still three stops to go and the loudest bunch of teenage boys has just gotten off, but not before one of them shoved their side hard enough to throw them off kilter for a split second.

They wrap their leather jacket tighter around their body, the vintage one that’s big enough to go past their bum and almost all the way to the hem of the skirt. The jacket smells of old skin and comfort, and they squeeze Josh’s hand the same bit tighter, tight enough to feel her heartbeat next to theirs. That’s comforting, too, if only a little.

“No need to be,” Josh says. “I’ll protect you.”

She flexes her arm muscles just for show, makes Faris laugh into their own mouth, and she says, “Come on, feel me.”

Faris feels her arm. “Feels protective.”

“There you go.” Josh leans in to kiss Faris’ cheek just quickly, doesn’t care whether her lipstick’s kiss-proof or not anymore, apparently, and she asks, “Still ready, though?”

“Yeah, I am.”

For the record, when they get to Dilys and Joe’s flat, no one asks any stupid questions. The first thing Dilys herself says to Faris when she goes to hug first Josh, then them, is, “You look amazing.”

Faris wraps their arms around her in return, tight enough they can smell her perfume.

“Thank you.”


End file.
